People are really getting into 'social experiment' surveys on Twitter

When you hear the name “Meryl Streep,” what’s the first movie that comes to mind? Perhaps it’s a classic like Kramer vs. Kramer, or maybe it’s a crowd favorite like Mamma Mia. Or maybe, for reasons no regular human could ever understand, it’s Ricki and the Flash. Everyone’s different!

If seeing a bunch of strangers respond to this prompt appeals to you, you’ll love the “social experiment” happening on Twitter this week. Basically, people are tweeting out categories — colors, One Direction members, Frank Ocean songs — then asking their followers to reply with the first example that comes to mind. The only rule: Don’t read the replies first.

Calling this game a “social experiment” is playing a little fast and loose with the definition, but it is interesting to see the results. A tweet about Frank Ocean songs, for example, elicited a noticeably wide range of responses. Clearly, Frank Ocean has made a lot of memorable music. 

When people were asked to name a member of One Direction, though, a disproportionate number chose Louis Tomlinson. Did the Louis brigade notice the tweet and come to defend their boy? Or did “Harry” seem like too obvious a choice? It seemed a little weird until … ah, yes, there it is. The question was posted by a Louis stan. 

So while we can’t really draw any real conclusions from the data — it’s all anecdotal — it’s fun to think about why the answers shook out the way they did. 

Plus, it’s fun to watch people half-jokingly try to get people to share their credit card numbers. (Do not share your credit card number.)